ANNUAL MEETING OF THE NATIONAL CIVIL SERVICE REFORM LEAGUE. DECEMBER 15 AND 16, 1910. PURSUANT to call duly issued, the Thirtieth Annual Meeting of the National Civil Service Reform League was held in Baltimore, Maryland, the 15th and 16th of December, 1910. The following delegates from Civil Service Reform Associations and Auxiliaries were in attendance during the several sessions: ALLEGHENY COUNTY: William C. Coffin. CHICAGO AND ILLINOIS: Robert Catherwood, Herbert E. Fleming. CONNECTICUT: General William A. Aiken, Prof. Henry W. Farnam, Charles G. Morris. INDIANA: Hon William Dudley Foulke, Harry J. Milligan. MARYLAND: DeCourcy W. Thom, William Reynolds, Archibald H. Taylor, Dr. H. O. Reik, Richard H. Gundry, Samuel Theobald, P. H. Tuck, Dr. Henry B. Jacobs, Hon. Charles J. Bonaparte, Hon. W. Cabell Bruce, J. M. Lawford, T. Erskine Carson, Edward Stabler, Jr., John Watson, Jr., Joseph Packard, Ira Remsen, Henry P. Goddard, Julian Le Roy White. MARYLAND AUXILIARY: Mrs. T. Harrison Garrett, Mrs. Horatio Garrett, Mrs Frank Carey, Mrs. Augusta Weber, Mrs. Charles W. Lord, Mrs. Charles F. Habighurst, Mrs. G. Lane Taneyhill, Mrs. W. S. Hull, Mrs. Winfield Peters, Mrs. Calvin Ferris Troupe, Mrs. Eli Strouse, Mrs. Joseph Wesenfeld, Mrs. John W. Hook, Mrs. Charles J. Bonaparte, Mrs. Albert Sioussat, Mrs. G. Huntington Williams, Mrs. B. F. Corkran, Miss Holt, Mrs. Mortimer, Miss Bond, Mrs. John C. Rose, Mrs. Reiman, Miss Hall, Mrs. Van Sickle, Mrs. Henry Hurd, Miss Eleanor Hurd, Mrs. Haydock and Mrs. William Reid. MASSACHUSETTS: Charles W. Eliot, Richard H. Dana, Arthur H. Brooks, Howard R. Guild, Samuel Y. Nash, William W. Vaughan, James P. Tolman, Hon. John F. Moors. MASSACHUSETTS AUXILIARY: Mrs. Francis C. Barlow, Miss Mabel Lyman, Miss Marian C. Nichols, Miss E. de C. Heath, Mrs. Richard H. Dana, Mrs. Charles William Eliot. NEW YORK: Rev. Leander T. Chamberlain, Hon. Winfred T. Denison, Webster C. Estes, A. S. Frissell, William G. Low, Thomas J. Skuse, Nelson S. Spencer, Hon. Robert G. Valentine, Hon. Everett P. Wheeler, Elliot H. Goodwin, Albert de Roode, Charles C. Burlingham, R. R. Bowker. NEW YORK AUXILIARY: Mrs. W. H. Schieffelin, Mrs. Agathe Schurz, Mrs. St. Clair McKelway, Miss Jean Disbrow, Mrs. Everett P. Wheeler. PENNSYLVANIA: Cyrus D. Foss, Jr., R. Francis Wood, Mrs. R. Francis Wood, Hon. Clinton Rogers Woodruff, Mrs. Clinton Rogers Woodruff. WISCONSIN: John A. Butler. In response to invitations issued by the League to civil service commissions, municipal reform associations and other bodies interested in the reform of the civil service, delegates were present from such organizations as follows: BALTIMORE MERCHANTS AND MANUFACTURERS Asso- CHICAGO CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: Elton Lower. Mooney. IOWA: Professor Charles Noble Gregory. KANSAS CITY CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: James W. S. Peters. NEW JERSEY CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: Willis Fletcher Johnson, James Kerney, Charles H. Bateman, Col. James R. Mullikin, Gardner Colby. NEW YORK CITY CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: F. A. Spencer, Thomas C. Murray. NEW YORK STATE CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: Harold N. Saxton. UNITED STATES CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: John T. Doyle, George R. Wales. WISCONSIN CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION: C. E. Buell, F. E. Doty. MEETINGS OF THE LEAGUE. The headquarters of the League during the meeting were at McCoy Hall, Johns Hopkins University. The proceedings at the sessions of the League, commencing on the morning of December 15th, were as follows: FIRST SESSION. McCoy Hall, Thursday morning, December 15th. THE League convened at 11.15 a. m., President Eliot presided. The minutes of the last Annual Meeting having been printed and distributed, their reading was dispensed with. Mr. Richard Henry Dana, Chairman of the Council, read the report of the Council.1 The following reports from Associations and Auxiliaries were then read: Mr. William C. Coffin submitted the report from the Allegheny County Civil Service Association: As has been previously reported to the league, the Allegheny County Association devotes its energies largely to the enforcement of the civil service law in the city of Pittsburgh. It has been our purpose to guarantee to the citizens, as well as to the employees of this city, substantial compliance with the terms of the civil service law. Our attitude has been advisory, as well as critical, and in some respects results appear to justify our position. Public sentiment in this city would seem to indicate that civil service has come to stay, and that the system, as established, must be extended as rapidly as possible until it includes every subordinate position. This sentiment, however, is not as militant as it might be, and officials of the city administration are disposed to dodge and evade it at every opportunity. The following positions have been placed in the exempt class by the civil service commission of this city during the past year, namely, the shade trees commission, consisting of three members, the chief medical inspector, and a stenographer in the city clerk's office. This, in addition to the exemptions which have been previously made, most of them without any protest on the part of this association. A signal victory for civil service was announced on September 21, 1910, when the civil service commission of Pittsburgh finally decided that twenty-nine health inspectors of the public schools of the city of Pittsburgh should be chosen by competitive examination. The positions pay from $1,000 to $2,000 per year, and can be filled only by qualified physicians. The civil service commission appointed Dr. Lawrence Litchfield, professor of clinical medicine at the University of Pittsburgh, Dr. T. J. Moyer, clinical instructor in medicine at the University of Pittsburgh, Dr. J. W. Boyce, professor of physical diagnosis at the University of Pittsburgh, Dr. T. D. Davis and Dr. P. J. Eaton, as the committee of examiners, to conduct the examinations for these positions. One hundred and nineteen physicians took the examination, and of this number only fifty-six were placed on the eligible list. From this eligible list the twenty-nine positions have been filled, and while there has been some protest about the results of the examination on the part of unsuccessful physicians, at the same time they were protests which the examining physicians could easily answer, and did answer. Great credit for the happy results thus obtained is due to the material assistance of the Allegheny County Medical Society, and the Academy of Medicine of Allegheny County, as well as to the Chamber of Commerce, the Pittsburgh Civic Commission, the Civic Club of Allegheny County, and other kindred associations. The departments of health and of public works of the city have been very active in endeavoring to evade the provisions of our law in many different ways. For example in the month of November, 1910, twenty-five provisional appointments were made in the department of public health alone. These appointees, however, must all take a competitive examination before their positions become permanent. During the past year, under similar circumstances, six provisional appointments were made and only two of the six appointees succeeded in securing a position near enough to the head of the eligible list to secure an appointment to permanent positions. As a result of the peculiar relation which the association bears to the employees of the city of Pittsburgh (many employees being members of the Association) certain facts came to our notice early in the year, which led to the prosecution of Joseph G. Armstrong, the director of the department of public works for falsification of the pay rolls of the city, at the time of the general elections in November, 1909. Owing to lack of funds, the prosecution was finally conducted by the voters league, several of whose officers are officers of this association. It seems that Mr. Armstrong had instructed the superintendents, who prepared the pay rolls in the various bureaus in his department, that all men who were paid by the day, principally laborers, both skilled and unskilled, should be paid. in full for election day, 1909, although no work was done for the city on that day. This was done on the plea that men who work on a salary do not work on election day, but receive full pay notwithstanding, and that if such men, who get much higher salary than the poor laborers are not docked for their absence on election day, then the poor man should receive the same consideration. The whole purpose of this payment was evidently to ingratiate the director with a great number of men who did not care particularly about the legality of the action which was taken. In other words, the director was using the city money to enhance and increase his own personal popularity among several hundred men. The cost to the city was in the neighborhood of $3,500. The payment was secured by a deliberate falsification of the payrolls, these rolls showing, under oath, that the men had worked on election day, whereas, as a matter of fact, no work had been done. Efforts at concealment of the facts only served to emphasize the criminality of the acts done. This association and other civic bodies have protested to the mayor that a man who would deliberately mulct the city |